Children's charity to benefit from firm's e-voting scrappage

Eight wee recyclers were on hand in Tullamore on Wednesday morning to help KMK Metals Recycling Ltd dismantle e-voting machines and hand over a generous €10,000 cheque to children's charity Barretstown. KMK Metals Recycling bought Ireland's ill-fated e-voting equipment for scrappage last month, and initially hit on an idea to sell off 100 of the machines to charity buyers in order to raise money for Barretstown. The charity venture didn't get permission from the Department of the Environment however and, along with the e-voting machines, had to be scrapped. After some deliberation Kurt Kyck of KMK Metals Recycling decided to go ahead with a donation, which was handed over at the KMK Metals Recycling plant in Cappincur, Tullamore last Wednesday morning. "It was brilliant, absolutely magic," Mr Kyck told the Offaly Independent after the cheque handover and photocall with children "borrowed" from staff who work with KMK Metals Recycling. Mr Kyck and his wife Edeltraud have been involved with Barretstown for a number of years. This week's €10,000 donation marks their company's "biggest single gesture" to charity however according to Mr Kyck. The big-hearted gesture was made possible he said not least because of the publicity his company has gotten over the past few weeks. "The amount of interest shown was amazing, "Mr Kyck said. "We were five or six days in a row in the newspapers." Barretstown CEO Dee Ahearn has expressed her delight at the donation, which will help the charity that offers sick children and their families a break from hospitals and the chance to be children again. "We're obviously delighted that Mr Kuck and the staff at KMK Metals have decided to donate this fantastic sum to Barretstown," she said this week. "This donation will give more children and their families the chance to experience the magic of Barretstown and to look to the future."